Environmental ethics and environmental anthropology

Abstract

Is there a particular angle that environmental anthropology offers environmental ethics? Local peoples find that both their natural and their social systems are jeopardized by global forces, requiring concerns for environmental justice. They are challenged to re-interpret outdated customs. Further, the encounter with these premodern systems may expose the metaphysics that drives modern science, epitomized in plans to re-engineer the Earth in an Anthropocene Epoch. Traditional views can serve as a catalyst. Somewhat to our surprise, we may conclude that our science-based, consumer driven, ever more exploitative cultures also need a revised environmental ethics.